Chapter 23
Sadie
“Gene is Fuckboy Lawyer?! ” June shoved hands into her hair, holding both sides of her head. “This whole time it was Gene, and I didn’t put the pieces together. But then you pretended he was a stranger. You introduced yourself to him right in front of me.”
It seemed there was no end to her shock or outrage.
It was only made worse that I really couldn’t blame her.
At the beginning of the conversation, she’d asked point-blank if I’d fucked her soon to be brother-in-law.
She didn’t really wait for me to answer.
Instead, she said she could tell from the way he’d opened the library door for me and the way I’d practically twirled my way up the aisle.
But as she dug deeper, it grew more dense and my actions more deceitful.
From the very start, I’d handled the situation with an astounding immaturity.
Wiggling my feet from side to side, I sank further in the sand. “I was shocked to see him when I got here.”
“Yeah, I bet.” At least she sounded a little less enraged, but the pity replacing it was almost worse.
From just outside of the mouth of the tent, Jamison stared out at the ocean with his brow furrowed and his arms crossed.
Clearly, he was deep in thought, but I was too busy chasing out the frayed edges of my mind to try and comprehend what he must be thinking.
Just a few minutes ago, everything had been contained and almost simple.
There was no way that was true now. Now he knew more than I wanted him to, and my pride was a shriveled husk in the pit of my stomach.
I might have told him someday about how I’d longed for him and inflated his feelings for me until my confidence was nearly nonexistent.
But I never would have done it like this.
At his side, Mike looked like he was on the verge of fighting or consoling his brother—I recognized it in the way my sister was staring at me.
“Sadie, why?” she asked.
I lifted one shoulder. “I like him.”
Her chest deflated like a popped balloon, all of the heat rushing from her to be replaced with a weariness. “It’s never gonna be enough.”
Jamison’s head snapped in our direction. He barely moved except for his hands clenching and releasing once before taking a step backward and turning in the direction of The Bronte. I let him go relieved he wouldn’t witness any more of this.
“You’re just going to keep repeating this over and over,” she said.
“You don’t know everything.” I shook my head, partially to disagree with her and partially to dispel the anxiety fog. “It’s different.”
“How?”
“We talked.” I let out a humorless chuckle. “I know that sounds so . . . but we’re at a better starting point than we’ve ever been.”
She rubbed at her collar bone, her elbow supported by her other hand. “I just don’t want to see you sad. And I’m so mad at him. I’ve been so angry with him for months, and I didn’t even know it.”
“It’s not all his fault. It’s not exactly surprising that I might not have been clear with him, possibly ever”—I exhaled deeply—”I think I might still have a lot to explain.
I believe in this, that we can be good. Like really good.
We’re taking it slow. We don’t have it all figured out. But it’s good.”
“Look, even though I am always on your side, I never thought it was all his fault.”
“My confrontation-avoiding ass.”
She widened her eyes. “Yes.”
“You didn’t have to agree so hard.”
Her fingers drummed a nervous beat on her skin.
I wiggled my toes a little deeper in the sand. “Can you just set this aside? I promise I will be such a devoted maid-of-honor tomorrow.”
“You could have waited until after my wedding to fuck Mike’s brother.”
It was my turn to widen my eyes. “I really couldn’t.”
“Ew.” She groaned. “I wish I’d never asked follow-up questions when you told me about sex with him.”
“You do have some unfortunate details about your fiancé’s brother,” I agreed. “Can you just not think about this until after your wedding?”
“I will commit to never thinking about you two fucking.”
Snorting, I said, “No, I mean—”
“I know,” she interrupted.
“Let’s shift all of the attention on to you.”
“Just the way I like it,” she joked with the roll of her eyes, which I took as promising.
“Do you still want to spend the night in my suite?”
She lifted an eyebrow and the corners of her lips turned down.
“We only had sex in his room,” I mumbled.
“Thank God.” Her shoulders fell in relief.
“You’re so dramatic.”
“Whatever. I have to grab my bag.”
Lifting my feet, I broke them free from the sand and shook them cleanish.
I hadn’t realized how cold it had been so many layers down, but now my toes were freezing.
The walk to Mike was a little awkward. I’d never seen him look so intense.
His normally relaxed features were pulled tight, making him resemble Jamison more than ever.
“Sorry this all got so . . . dramatic,” I said.
He took hold of June’s hand. “As long as she’s good, I’m fine.”
“I am,” she assured him.
It made my heart ache watching them sometimes, wanting the same unconditional support.
I overheard Mike ask again if she was okay as I walked toward the tent to get my clutch from where I’d left it on the table.
The wind carried her admission that she might have inserted herself into my life too much.
I had a looming feeling that I’d handled one crisis just to walk into another one.
But maybe that was just the pessimistic side of me coming through.
I barely caught his retort, something along the lines of being shocked by Jamison’s response.
My phone buzzed inside the little bag, and I pulled it out making my way to the path leading to my building.
Alicia had sent me a photo of her ex-husband turned now-boyfriend, Remi, sleeping with his cat curled up on his chest, and her dog stretched out on his legs.
I let it give me a bit of comfort. If they could transcend all of their past and issues to be together in a healthy way, then Jamison and I could too.
I was willing to figure it out.
He just had to be willing too.
The hallway to our rooms stretched longer than the whole rest of the walk had.
As if it took two extra steps to span the space than it ever had before, but eventually I stood outside of his door.
It stood solid and impartial; completely unperturbed that it was between me and the man I loved.
That it may possibly be the final boss in whatever game Jamison and I were playing.
With clammy hands, I knocked. After a few nervous beats of my heart, his footsteps padded closer and the door opened.
He’d unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, and his hair fell in chaotic tufts as if he’d been running his hands through it. He pinched his lips together and swallowed. Blinking, he avoided looking at me, suddenly consumed with a chip in the finish on the door frame.
I skipped a greeting to say, “Not doing so good, huh?”
He flinched. “It was me the whole time, the guy?”
I chewed my lower lip and nodded.
“The longer I know, the more I understand. The more I get it. The way you ghosted me—that I was too oblivious to even see.” He ran a hand down his face. “God, I just kept texting you.”
I kept my mouth shut instead of pointing out that it would have been less passive aggressive for me to tell him to stop texting. It seemed he was processing through something, that it might be better for me to listen.
“Your sister knew—shit, even my brother knew—and that was why you pretended to be strangers,” he went on, his voice strangely hollow.
“Yeah. But that was to protect me and not you.”
His scowl deepened. I knew him well enough to know he meant it as a question.
“You’re always so reliable, and on time. I thought if they knew, they’d see a different side of the story and realize how much I had fucked it up.”
“How did you fuck up?”
“I didn’t really tell you what I wanted. I held back.” I fidgeted, brushing some of the sand off my feet and ankles. “I was more concerned with saving face than being honest with you.”
He shook his head. “Your instincts were right.”
“No, they weren’t. Even if I ended up completely humiliated, at least I wouldn’t have been lying to myself that I’d done the hard thing. I thought you had let me down easy when I brought up wanting something meaningful—”
“I didn’t think you could have meant me.”
“See, I wasn’t clear enough, because I was too afraid. My pride was more important than my feelings for you.”
“Or you knew that Fuckboy Lawyer wouldn’t add up.”
I shook my head. “I knew you might not want to. And . . . sorry about that name.”
“It fits.” There was a bleakness in the slump of his shoulders and the hang of his head. It was in the thin timbre of his words, as if they could be snapped in half as easily as spoken.
My hope shattered like glass on the rocks along the shore—washing up and washing out.
Through the tightening of my throat, I asked, “Giving up?”
“I told you I didn’t think I could give you what you want, what you deserve.”
“And I told you just being there would be enough.” I dabbed at tears welling under my eyes, but my voice came out strong and controlled.
Unlike his voice that had grown hoarse and strained. “But I’m not. Even your sister knows it.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“She said it, that it was never going to be enough, and she’s right.”
“That’s not what she was saying—” I began to explain but he interrupted.
“All I have to offer you is what you’ve already gotten from me. There’s nothing more.”
I rocked back on my heels, blown away with every insecure reveal from him. “Jesus, Jamison, are you suggesting all you’re good for is sex?”
“No . . . I’ll always be a good coworker for you too. I’m good at my job.” It felt like the space he took up was empty, as if he were barely present. He sank into himself.
“That is the most depressing bullshit I’ve ever heard.”
He turned his face away from me, but I took his jaw in my hands his stubble tickling my palms. There was a line between his eyebrows, and tears pooled along his lower lashes.
“You,” I began when I was certain I had his full attention, “have so much to work through. How you feel about yourself isn’t true, and it’s not healthy. I would be there with you to support you, comfort you, be with you if you’d let me. But I will not chase you. I will not wait for you.”
My voice began to wobble as my heart broke for the loss of him in my life—for the loss of what we could be.
Letting go of this man I had wanted for so long, a story I’d been telling myself.
But this was well and truly the end of the cycle.
I would not end up back in his bed. Not when he knew what we were letting go of, not when everything was on the line, and he still didn’t step up to what this relationship could be.
Staring into his eyes, I spoke what I’d been too afraid to say. “I love you.”
The air rushed from his lungs as he pulled away from my touch, but not before his tear fell to land on my wrist.
“Sadie,” he said between shallow gasps, “I . . . ”
I waited, silently begging him to say it back while knowing he wouldn’t.
He slowed his breathing little by little, his fists clenching and releasing at his sides, until finally he whispered, “I can’t.”
Taking a step backward, I retreated, shoving all of the pain and rejection into a dark corner of my brain.
I shoved it into a box and locked it away.
When I got home, I would need to deal with it, but for the remainder of my trip, and especially for my sister’s wedding, I’d ignore it. I was practiced at that, anyway.
“You won’t,” I corrected pulling my key card from my clutch. “If you wanted to, you could.”
Inside my suite, I let the door close behind me.
Devastation leaked out of the place it was supposed to be hidden, but with it was also a victorious feeling.
It straightened my spine leaving me empowered.
I’d done the thing I’d always been too afraid to do.
Even though it hadn’t changed the outcome, it did feel more powerful than letting fear make my decisions.
I wiped away the few tears that had escaped and shook the tension from my limbs. I picked up the phone to room service and ordered a bottle of bubbly. I’d pop it with June to celebrate her upcoming nuptials, as well as quietly celebrate my own bittersweet moment.